Headlights
by elelel
Summary: Late night wonderings of a troubled mind. Inspired by Taking Back Sunday's Ghost Man On Third


A/N: This fic was inspired by the song Ghost Man On Third by Taking Back Sunday.

Headlights 

I wonder when it was in my poor, pathetic life that everything went wrong. I often wonder things like that. Things that can never be answered, things that are truly maddening and at times threaten to tear me apart from the inside. I often like to dwell on the "what ifs" of life. What if I was never born? Would the people I know and love be better off? Would _she _be better off?

I am generic and ordinary in every way. My name is not important. Millions of others share my name. Others share my hair color, my eyes, my body frame and even my sullen personality. I am not an individual, I am one of many. Except for one simple thing. I was born different from everyone. I was brought into this earth with a burden that many would think too difficult to bear. No one except me knows about it, they can feel it of course, its potency is thick and sometimes fills their thoughts. But they can only wonder. I know.

Now we're back to wondering again. Even I can't appreciate the irony in the fact that wondering is the only certainty in my life. Sometimes at night I sit out in the street in front of the children's park on the corner and just think. She found me there once, almost gave her a heart attack I must admit. She chided me endlessly that night. I guess I should have been glad that she cared enough to drag me out of a street in the middle of the night, but I didn't thank her. I don't say much to anyone anymore. Talking never seems worth the energy it would require. So I just hung my head and pretended to listen. I've heard it so many times I don't have to anymore.

I doubt she'll ever really understand, even though she wants so desperately to. How do I explain to her that I was just being patient and waiting for headlights to envelope me before my untimely demise? She doesn't know my secret. She doesn't know what I keep inside the caverns of my empty heart. And if I have anything to say about it, she never will.

Sometimes when I sit on the road I don't think of anything at all. I just enjoy the cool wind blowing through my hair, the way the cold cement feels beneath me. It's in those few precious moments of peace that I am free from wondering. It's only then when I feel I can shape my own future, experience life on my own schedule. It never lasts long but I relish the feeling it leaves within my shattered soul.

It's times like those when silence means everything.

Most of the time, though, I am wrestling with my thoughts, trying in vain to make some order of them all. It is useless because most are mere questions. Life's imponderables. The questions that no one likes to dwell on because there simply is no answer. Or not one they would like anyway. For hours on end I sit, just thinking and waiting. When I hear the rev of an engine my heart pounds, with fear or excitement I'm not quite sure. I like to assure myself that when it happens I won't feel a thing. That it will be so fast and instantaneous I will not have time to think, to wonder. I wish of such a thing.

I am beginning to notice the countless inches being sliced from my waist. I hardly eat anymore because I am never hungry. My heart is aching so I guess I felt the need to let my body suffer too. Clothes that once clung to my body feel large and hang limply from my thinning frame. I feel pathetic and lonely, but there is no escape.

I went to her house that night, a small piece of parchment clutched in my left hand. I raised my fist to knock, but before I could, the door opened and she was there. There in all her horribly beautiful glory and I couldn't speak. She is my angel, my best friend, my joy and my pain. She is my life, and I couldn't leave her without saying goodbye.

I cupped her face in my calloused palms and my lips fell gently upon hers. My fingers weaved their way through her chestnut hair and I felt at peace. I could never forget the feeling even if I wanted to. Sooner than I wanted to, we broke apart and I laid a single finger on her lips. I leaned down and whispered quietly into her ear.

"No one is to know about this."

I am here again. Alone in the middle of the road, in front of the children's park on the corner. My wonderings are blissfully absent but the aura of the air is tangible. I cannot keep my secret anymore. It is heavy and leaden, weighing me down until I fall to my knees in despair. It's there the headlights find me, dressed in a fashion that fits the inconsistencies of my moods. Suddenly it is just upon me, the revving engine only a whisper to my unknowing ears, the collision only a nudge in a direction unknown.

Somewhere in the chaos I hear her voice, but maybe it's just my imagination. I have one last breath to breathe, and I whisper to her.

"This is what living like this does…don't let me down."


End file.
